


Walk Inside Yourself

by Trobadora



Category: Doctor Who
Genre: Episode Related, Episode: s10e09 Empress of Mars, Gen, The Vault (Doctor Who)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-10
Updated: 2018-01-10
Packaged: 2019-03-01 08:22:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,209
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13290909
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Trobadora/pseuds/Trobadora
Summary: Missy and the Vault. Missy and one of her victims, a.k.a. the TARDIS. And always, Missy and the Doctor.





	Walk Inside Yourself

**Author's Note:**

  * For [navaan](https://archiveofourown.org/users/navaan/gifts).



Time blurs in the Vault.

Quantum-locked as it is, everything outside feels remote and distorted, like sound under water. Even with excellent temporal senses, an acute sense of timelines, of presents and pasts and futures and all the little sideways eddies even most Time Lords never notice, it's all not quite _there_ , as if none of it matters.

Missy has been here for decades, and she's not even bored yet. Not truly; not enough to stop. Not enough to _leave_.

It's strange, being so sedentary. For the Doctor no less than for her - he's never yet done it of his own accord, not if he didn't have to, not for any appreciable length of time. TARDIS broken? A war to fight? Yes, those will do it - have done it - but nothing less than that will.

Missy, of course, isn't _less_. She's _more_ , and she won't let him forget.

He stays. She stays. It's all a lot of staying, and not a lot of getting anywhere, and she expects to lose patience with it any moment, but she doesn't. She hasn't.

Not yet.

~*~

She left the Vault once, in the sixties, just because she could. Just because the Doctor kept looking at her with those eyes, and those eyebrows ...

His panic was the funniest thing. His look, when he finally found her right above on the roof slope dangling her feet over the gutter, was _delightful_.

"No. Missy, no, this isn't what we agreed on," he said, aiming for harsh and ending up with babbling. He was afraid. Afraid they'd be enemies again, now, and oh, wasn't that gratifying. 

"You're afraid," Missy said, delighted.

"I'm always afraid." And always ready to admit it. "Missy, please -"

She smiled at him with _all_ her teeth, and kept smiling as she went back to the Vault, watching him sputter.

"You were getting complacent, dear," she told him, and watched realisation bloom like a mushroom cloud.

He needed to know: it couldn't work - _can't_ work, this, not with her just locked inside. Not with her no more than a prisoner.

Yes, she asked. Yes, she offered. But he needs to know she's still choosing this, every day - and over better alternatives than execution, too.

She needed the reminder as well, at the time. She hasn't bothered since. Hasn't needed to.

It's been ... strange. He and her, she and him, together: the Doctor and the Master, for longer now than they've ever spent together since they left Gallifrey behind. It's surreal. It's like home, a thing she never knew what to do with, even when she nominally had one.

Not that the Doctor is different. Two of a kind, the two of them.

~*~

Now, five decades later, time _unblurs_. The world sharpens around her, and she jumps a little on the floor, just feeling the gravity, the solidity of the planet's mass, the tangle of billions of years of history, all of it immediate and _here_.

She's out of the Vault. The bald one _let_ her, asked her for _help_ , because oh look, the Doctor's in trouble! And who's supposed to come to the rescue? Missy, after all.

The Doctor's pet - a reconstructed one; he was down to just the head once, and in her opinion that must have been an improvement - is deliciously terrified. If Missy had an evil plan just now, this would be perfect.

Instead, she's playing it by ear. Improvisation is a talent - one of her best.

The last time she stepped into this TARDIS, she rewired it into a paradox machine. Still one of her more ingenious plans.

Now, she'll admit - only in the privacy of her own mind, of course - that she's just a teensy bit worried about how the TARDIS will react to her. The thing isn't exactly friendly towards her, never has been.

And all right, perhaps it has reason, but that doesn't exactly help, now does it?

Still, the TARDIS is here, not on Mars or wherever, and the door opens for her with just a tiny bit more resistance than it should.

"Ran out on the Doctor, did you?" Missy asks brightly as she dances inside, ignoring Nardole nervously circling around her - at a safe distance, of course. He's a companion of the Doctor's, after all, so he's not a _complete_ imbecile. "Don't blame you - he is a bit much, sometimes."

A grating telepathic noise thrums against Missy's nerves, a denial if ever she heard one.

Of course the thing is right to be wary of Missy, but still, that's no cause to sulk, is it? Missy pats the console - no isomorphic controls; look at that! - and throws a not-very-reassuring look toward Nardole. "Tell us what's wrong with you, now, dear. Or I'll just have to take you apart bit by bit until I find out. And that would be ever so much work, wouldn't it?"

The mental thrum grows shrill.

Missy runs a quick diagnosis. All the displays lag horribly. Either the TARDIS is being obstinate, or she urgently needs some work. Perhaps both; wouldn't it be just like the Doctor to call his TARDIS a friend, and then drag his heels on basic maintenance protocols?

As she studies the readouts, Missy considers. The thing is refusing to dematerialise; she can see that in the logs. What she can't see is a reason why. She tries it herself, just to watch it happen. The TARDIS powers down instead. It's clearly not a failure; it's an act of will.

Well; she _can_ force the TARDIS to cooperate. Easy-peasy. She's done it before.

She had a plan, then, though. She doesn't now.

"Fine." Missy throws up her hands in frustration. "I'm going to take a look at the modulator for the Time Rotor. I'm not flying a TARDIS with this much misalignment! Don't get any ideas," she adds, as an afterthought.

She grabs a diagnostic scanner from a compartment that looks like it hasn't been opened since the last time she stood at these controls, then climbs under the console. The hum against her nerves intensifies, and there's a tremble in it now. The thing is _afraid_ of her, isn't it?

Something strange builds up behind Missy's eyes - a pressure. It made her cry before. Not now, though. Not here. She bares her teeth.

She opens an access panel. Electricity surges; she pulls her hand back with a hiss. Then looks at her scanner and makes a face. This wouldn't have been lethal to a mouse.

"Can't you do better than that?" Scathing.

After a long, tense moment - she's waiting for a proper surge, really - the TARDIS's hum instead softens into something slightly less shrill and nerve-jangling.

Missy works. The TARDIS doesn't resist again, and somehow, that's worse. Missy's eyes narrow. She clearly has a TARDIS with _intent_ here. But what intent, she's still not sure of.

Nardole has already tried to talk to her several times. She keeps ignoring him, and eventually he stops, but he doesn't go away. Oh well; can't have everything. 

It's fun, though, tinkering with the circuits, and when it comes to bringing the modulator into alignment, she uses her own time sense rather than the read-outs as a gauge. Just for the fun of it; just for the feel.

She's out of the Vault. The Doctor is trapped somewhere out of the way. And she has a TARDIS she can bring under her control. She could do anything, go anywhere. 

After she's done with the modulator, Missy looks at the energy feeds. Buying time. After all, there's a decision to make. Two decisions, and she's not sure about either. 

The Doctor's just fine on Mars, anyway. Doesn't matter when she leaves, only when she arrives. _If_ she's going to arrive. 

Finally she sits back, leans against a strut. "Here's where I threaten you again, isn't it? Bad TARDIS, running away from the Doctor. I'll have to punish you."

The TARDIS sends a telepathic wave at her that feels rather like a cheese grater against skin.

"Oh, don't be such a killjoy. You're the one who ran out of him, dear, not me. I'm the one who stayed." And isn't that a brain-scrambling thought.

Another wave crashes against her mental shields. "I did say I'd take you apart bit by bit. You know I can."

The Doctor won't like it, brute-forcing his TARDIS like that, but he doesn't get a say. Missy doesn't get a say either, not really. Whatever she chooses, wherever she decides to go - Mars, Raxacoricofallapatorius, anywhere - she needs a functional TARDIS first.

And the TARDIS is refusing to dematerialise.

No choice, not really. It doesn't sit well with her. She almost wishes she'd stayed in the Vault, refused Nardole's plea for help. 

It would have served them all right, too.

No choice, then: she has to do it. Might as well go for broke, turn her back on all of this. She'll have to get rid of the sulky egg-head, too. He's still watching her as if that could possibly make any difference, but it would take no effort at all.

The TARDIS just keeps screaming at her, as if _that_ would help.

"Do you _want_ me to do it?" she snaps at the silly thing, and then her own words bring her up short. _Does_ the TARDIS want her to break it apart? Is it trying to make a convoluted sort of point?

Something in her throat is suddenly tight. She's not sure what, but it doesn't belong there. It needs to be dislodged.

No one can understand a TARDIS's mind. It lives more in the Vortex than in linear time, barely knows _here_ and _now_ from _there_ and _then_. But this one loves the Doctor, if something felt by such a machine can be called love.

The TARDIS loves the Doctor, and the Doctor has been spending rather a lot of time with the Mistress. Is _that_ what this is all about?

"Oh, you stupid thing," Missy breathes. "Are you _jealous?_ " 

The TARDIS hums against her senses, shrill and indignant. 

In Missy's chest, in her abdomen, something is trying to shudder free. She twitches with it, once, twice, lets out a snort. And then here she is, the Mistress, in the crawl space under a Time Rotor, laughing herself _absolutely silly_.

What _is_ the universe coming to?

Finally she wipes her face. Wetness: tears. Why is it always tears, these days? She doesn't mind these so much, though. Missy takes a breath. Decisions, decisions ... 

She closes her eyes and leans forward, her forehead against the central column. The telepathic field presses against her mind, almost oppressively strong.

 _You want me to hurt you, do you?_ she thinks at it. _Well, how about I don't?_ She's contrary that way.

If the TARDIS can parse words, she can certainly parse thoughts - more easily, most likely. And her reaction confirms it: a sharp, grating wail, incredulousness.

 _It'd be you, doing this to him._ And the TARDIS must know it: it's her, forcing Missy's hand. The mental wave that surges against Missy is all furious denial again.

 _Sit here and sulk,_ Missy thinks. _Or let's just go._ She feels tired. Weary and worn. She pushes herself to her feet, and climbs.

Then she's standing at the console again, bringing up coordinates. She's doing it, after all. She's coming for the Doctor.

Not that he needs her help - not really. He'd find his way off Mars and back here eventually, even if he had to go the long way round. It's the pet who needs a timely rescue. Missy resents that; she really does.

Not enough to stop her, though.

She queues the dematerialisation sequence. The TARDIS's presence stutters against her. The lights in the control room flicker. 

"I _am_ his friend," Missy murmurs, too quiet for Nardole to hear. If this doesn't work -

The time rotor groans to life. They slip into the Vortex.

~*~

Time was blurred in the Vault. Everything was at a distance except Missy herself, except the Doctor. It ... wasn't bad, for a start.

A start at what, she's still not sure. She stayed - will stay - because she wants to find out.

Decades inside; a few hours outside, now. A TARDIS to play with, and a Doctor to rescue. It's a fun excursion.

As they tumble through the Vortex, the TARDIS is there all around her - that telepathic field, now scraping, now just slightly brushing against her senses.

In her memory, red lights flash, and the cloister bell rings, incessantly. Missy's lips turn down.

It was a good plan, the paradox machine. It _was_.

Now, the lights in the control room are blue and white, and the tense hum against her senses barely feels hostile any more.

They're almost to Mars; the Doctor awaits. Missy's fingers twitch. She could still change course, so easily. But it's just a reflex, and she's not really tempted. Not much, anyway.

It's a fun excursion, yes, but she won't mind the quiet of the Vault, after. She thinks it might even be nice.

Perhaps they got somewhere after all, just by staying. Perhaps that's why she hasn't grown too bored. Perhaps she'll even tell the Doctor that, some day.

The materialisation sequence kicks in, bumpy as ever, and Missy smiles.


End file.
